1. Agreement
Authors: Jiří Hana
Elke Teich
Hana Skoumalová
Kamenka Staykova
Lena Sokolova
Michael V.
Boldasov
Table of contents of the chapter:
1.1.1 Morphological
abbreviations
1.2 Subject-Predicate Agreement
1.2.2.1 Inflection
of the Thing
1.2.2.3 Information
passing systems
1.3 Agreement within nominal group
1.4 Agreement of subject and predicative adjective
1.4.2.1 Preselections
on the clause rank
1.1 Introduction
Agreement or congruence can be described as two (or more) syntactical units sharing particular grammatical features, e.g., case, number, gender or person. In Czech, Bulgarian and Russian, we can distinguish three kinds of agreement:
1. Subject – predicate. Present in Bulgarian, Czech and Russian
(1) E: The line disappeared.
Bg: Линията е изчезнала.
L: line-FSg is-Sg3 disappeared-FSg
Cz: Úsečka zmizela.
L: Line-FSg disappeared-FSg3.
2. Subject – predicative adjective agreement. Present in Bulgarian, Czech and Russian
(2) E: Command is accessible.
Bg: Командата е достъпна.
L: command-FSg is-Sg3 accessible-FSg
Cz: Příkaz je dostupný.
L: Command-ISgNom is-Sg3 accessible-NomISg.
Ru: Команда доступна.
L: Command-FSg is-accessible-FSg.
3. Agreement within the nominal group. Present in Czech, Russian
(3) E: Enter the fifth external point.
Bg: Задайте петата
външна точка.
L: Enter-Pl2 fifth-FSg external-FSg point-FSg
Cz: Zadejte pátý externí bod.
L: Enter-Pl2 fifth-ISgAcc external-ISgAcc point-ISgAcc
Ru: Введите пятую внешнюю точку.
L: Enter-Pl2 fifth-FSgAcc external-FSgAcc point-FSgAcc
Agreement can be classified also from another perspective: syntactical or semantic. Although semantic agreement is also present in described languages, it is quite rare and not important for our domain, therefore in the following we will deal only with the syntactical one.
1.1.1 Morphological abbreviations
Throughout this chapter, in word-by-word translation to English we use following abbreviations of morphological categories. Categories present in the abbreviations are in the following order: POS[1], Gender, Number, Case and Person. A category is omitted if it is not relevant (e.g. case for finite verb) or not interesting in the given context. The possible values for each category are the following (of course, not all are present in all languages):
· POS: Adj (adjective), PastPart (past participle), etc.
· Gender: M (masculine, in Czech masculine animate), I (masculine inanimate[2]), F (feminine), N (neuter)
· Number: Sg (singular), Pl (plural)
· Case[3]: Nom (nominative), Gen (genitive), Dat (dative), Acc (accusative), Voc (vocative), Loc (locale) and Ins (instrumental)
· Person: 1, 2, 3
Therefore, for example: FSg means
feminine singular, Sg3 means Singular third person and NSgNom means neuter,
singular, nominative.
|
|
Czech |
Russian |
Bulgarian |
|
Gender |
|
M, F, N |
|
|
I |
|
|
|
|
Number |
Sg, Pl |
||
|
Case |
Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc, Loc, Ins |
– |
|
|
Voc |
|
||
|
Person |
1,2,3 |
||
Table 1 – Comparison of morphological features relevant for agreement
1.2 Subject-Predicate Agreement
1.2.1 Analysis
In Czech, Bulgarian and Russian, a predicate[4] usually agrees with its nominative subject in person, number and gender (if applicable).
(4) E: Command was accessible.
Bg: Командата
беше
достъпна.
L: Command-FSg was-Sg3 accessible-FSg
Cz: Příkaz byl[5] dostupný.
L: Command-ISg was-ISg3 accessible-ISg.
(5) E: Command was accessible.
Bg: Командата
е достъпна.
L: Command-FSg is-Sg3 accessible-FSg
Cz: Příkaz je dostupný.
L: Command-ISg is-Sg3 accessible-ISg.
(6)
E: The system enables you to create a multiline style …
Bg: Системата
позволява да
създадете...
L: System-FSg enable-Sg3 create-inf.
Cz: Systém umožňuje vytvářet styly multičár ...
L: System-ISg enables-3Sg to-create styles of-multilines ...
This holds even if this subject is realized by a zero pronoun (so called pro-drop)[6].
(7) E: Enter the distance between ...
Bg: Задайте
разстоянието между...
L: enter-Pl2 distance between…
Cz: Zadejte vzdálenost mezi ...
L: Enter-Pl2 distance between ....
Ru: Введите расстояние
между …
L: Enter-2Pl distance between ....
(8) E: Enter the distance between ...
Bg: Вие задайте разстоянието между...
L: you-Pl2 enter-Pl2 distance between…
Cz: Vy zadejte vzdálenost mezi ...
L: You enter-2Pl distance between ....
If the subject is in a case different from nominative[7] (e.g., in genitive)
(9) E: Five points disappeared.
Cz: Pět bodů zmizelo.
L: Five points-IPlGen disapeared-NSg3.
or the category of case is inappropriate for the subject (infinitival or sentential subjects)[8].
(10) E: To open a drawing is simple.
Cz: Otevřít kresbu je jednoduché.
L: To-open drawing-FsgAcc is simple.
or if the verb has no subject at all (e.g. meteorological verbs or certain feelings verbs)[9]
(11) E: It rains.
Bg: Вали.
L: Rains-Sg3
Cz: Prší.
L: Rains-Sg3
(12) E: I am cold.
Bg: Студено ми е.
L: Cold I-Dat is-Sg3
Cz: Je mi zima.
L: Is-3Sg I-Dat cold
(13) E: The button will be clicked[10].
Cz: Klepne se na tlačítko.
L: Click-Sg3 refl on button.
then the verb is assigned the default category of gender, number and person, which is neuter, singular and 3rd person.
Number of the predicate is determined by grammatical number of the subject, no matter if it denotes single object or set of objects.
(14) E: The scissors disappeared.
Cz: Nužky zmizely.
L: Scissors-IPlNom disappeared-IPl3.
1.2.1.1 Compound verbal forms
Compound verbal forms consist of finite forms of auxiliary verb and nonfinite forms (infinitive, participle) of the meaningful verb. For example, in Czech there are following compound verbal forms:
|
future tense |
aux + infinitive |
já budu volat |
|
past tense |
aux + past participle[11] |
já jsem volal |
|
present conditional |
aux + past participle |
já bych
volal |
|
past conditional |
present cond. of aux[12] + past participle |
já bych byl
volal |
|
passive |
aux + passive participle |
já jsem volán |
For detailed description of compound verbal forms (see ## Chapter 4. Mood and modality). All these words (except infinitive) have to agree with the subject in the same way as finite verb does[13]. The only difference is the set of morphological categories the word accepts:
|
Language |
Verbal form |
Gender |
Number |
Person |
|
Bulgarian, Czech, Russian |
finite |
– |
+ |
+ |
|
participles |
+[14] |
+ |
– |
|
|
Bulgarian |
infinitive (da construction) |
+[15] |
+ |
– |
(15) E: You can save the line.
Bg: Вие можете да запазите линията.
L: you-Pl2 can-Pl2 save-Pl2DaConstr line
1.2.1.2
Coordinated subject
In Czech and Russian, agreement with coordinated subject is rather complicated. For our domain, we can simplify the problem by assuming that number of predicate with coordinated subject is always plural and that person has to be uniform across the nominal group. For more detailed description of this problem for Czech see [Bémová 1995]
For Czech, gender of predicate will be minimal gender of participants of coordination, computed under following order[16]: m < i < f < n for Czech. This covers also trivial case when the gender of all participants is the same. For Bulgarian and Russian, this is not important because gender is not distinguished in plural.
(16) E: The line and the box were deleted.
Cz: Úsečka a políčko byly smazány.
L: Line-FSg and field-NSg were-FPl3 deleted-FPl
Ru: Линия и окно были удалены.
L: Line-FSg and field-NSg were-Pl deleted-Pl
However in Czech, there is an exception: if all participants have neuter gender and at least one is in singular then the gender of the predicate is feminine[17]:
(17) E: The button and the box were enabled.
Cz: Tlačítko a políčko byly povolené.[18]
L: Button-NSg and field-NSg were-FPl3 enabled-FPl
For more detailed description of agreement in Czech see [Kopečný 1962]
1.2.2 Implementation
The main problem with implementation is that number and especially gender of subject are not known when it is possible to inflectify finite, and it is not possible to inflectify finite when they are known. Therefore, it is necessary to use agreement operator (in simplified notation =). To make the treatment consistent we will use the same mechanism also for person.[19]
Second problem is that we do not know how to implement linguistically plausible notion of default values for finite. Therefore, we will handle this case in the same way as normal agreement (determine the values in subject side systems and pass them by agreement operators to predicate). Of course, this does not work for sentences without subject, however such sentences are not in our domain.
Of course, each language uses only systems that it needs (Bulgarian omits systems dealing with case, Bulgarian and Russian omits inanimate gender, etc.)
1.2.2.1 Inflection of the Thing
The agreement systems are all heavily dependent on the inflectional properties of the noun or pronoun (even not inserted) realizing the subject. Therefore, we present the features for these properties first:
For case:
Thing-Case-<C>
where <C> Î {Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc, Voc, Loc, Ins}
For gender:
Thing-Gender-<G>
where <G> Î {M, I, F, N}
For number:
Thing-Number-<N>
where <N> Î {Sg, Pl}
Not all of these properties are present in all languages and properties for one category need not to be in one system.
1.2.2.2 Subject side systems
These systems determine the categories of predicate depending on the categories of the subject. We can distinguish two cases – the predicate does (SVAgreement) or does not (SVNoAgreement) agree with its subject. It does when the subject is in nominative, it does not otherwise (genitive subject[20])
SVAgreement(Thing-Case-Nom)
[SVAgreement]
SVNoAgreement(Thing-Case-Gen)
[SVNoAgreement]
Systems determining gender of the predicate (neuter is default):
Subj-Agr-Gender-<G> (Thing-Gender-<G>
& SVAgreement)
[Subj-Agr-Gender-<G>]
where <G>
Î {M,I,F}
Subj-Agr-Gender-N (Thing-Gender-N or
SVNoAgreement)
[Subj-Agr-Gender-N]
Systems determining number of the predicate (singular is default):
Subj-Agr-Number-Sg (Thing-Number-Sg or
SVNoAgreement)
[Subj-Agr-Gender-Sg]
Subj-Agr-Number-Pl (Thing-Number-Pl &
SVAgreement)
[Subj-Agr-Number-Pl]
Systems determining person of the predicate (3rd person is default):
Subj-Agr-Person-<P>
(Pronoun-Person-<P> & SVAgreement)
[Subj-Agr-Person-<P>]
where <P>
Î {1,2}
Subj-Agr-Person-3
(Pronoun-Person-3 or
nominal-term-resolution or SVNoAgreement)
[Subj-Agr-Person-3]
1.2.2.3 Information passing systems
These systems are used to pass information determined by subject systems to appropriate words of predicate.
System passing information to finite:
SUBJECT-FINITE-AGREEMENT (Finite-Inserted &
Subject-Inserted)
[Subject-Finite-Agreement]
(Subject = Finite
(Subj-Agr-Number-Sg ~
:::Number-Sg-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Number-Pl ~
:::Number-Pl-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Person-1 ~
:::Person-1-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Person-2 ~
:::Person-2-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Person-3 ~
:::Person-3-Form))
This system ensures that when Subject side systems determine number and person of the predicate (i.e. enters feature Subj-Agr-*-*), finite is inflectified appropriately.
System passing information to past or passive participles:
Subject-AuxStem-Agreement
( (Past-Participle-Inserted |
Participle-Passive) &
Subject-Inserted)
[Subject-AuxStem-Agreement]
(Subject = AuxStem
(Subj-Agr-Number-Sg ~
:::Number-Sg-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Number-Pl ~
:::Number-Pl-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Gender-M ~
:::Gender-M-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Gender-I ~
:::Gender-I-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Gender-F ~
:::Gender-F-Form)
(Subj-Agr-Gender-N ~
:::Gender-N-Form))
This system ensures that when Subject side systems determine number and gender of the predicate, participle is inflectified appropriately.
Bulgarian resources use similar system to ensure agreement with infinitive (da construction), it connects it by agreement with finite:
AUXSTEM-INSERT (Modal | P-Future | Da-phase)
[Auxstem-Inserted]
+ Auxstem
+ Da-particle
! Da-particle da
^ Da-particle ^ Auxstem
(Finite = AuxStem
(Person-First-Form ~ :::Person-First-Form)
(Person-Second-Form ~
:::Person-Second-Form)
(Person-Third-Form ~ :::Person-Third-Form)
(Number-Sg-Form ~ :::Number-Sg-Form)
(Number-Pl-Form ~
:::Number-Pl-Form))
1.2.2.4 Coordination
Even if we simplify the problem by assuming that that number of predicate with coordinated subject is always plural and that person has to be uniform across the nominal group, it still remains to determine gender of the predicate and than inflectify it appropriately[21]. The former is possible by determining minimal value of gender by comparing two adjacent members of coordinated subject each time. However the latter seems to be impossible in current version of KPML – we need to pass information up (similar to gender and person for simple subject), but we need to pass it across more than one rank – therefore we cannot use agreement operator.
As a (very inelegant) solution we apply the feminine gender to the predicate by default:
- In plural, forms participles, etc in feminine gender are the forms in masculine inanimate
- Feminine and masculine inanimate forms are the most probable in texts of CAD/CAM domain
- In our corpus, there are no coordinated subjects
1.2.2.5 Language differences
1.2.2.5.1 Czech
Previous implementation (except system Auxstem-insert for Bulgarian) describes Czech, because it has all morphological features present in other two languages.
1.2.2.5.2 Bulgarian
Most of the differences in Bulgarian are implications of the fact that Bulgarian does not have cases. In Bulgarian Subject is always agreed with the predicate, so some of Subject side systems described above (and in particular, fork for applying default no-agreement cases (SVNoAgreement)) are not needed. The predicate in Bulgarian can contain "da-construction" and the system dealing with Subject-"da-construction" agreement in person and number is presented above.
1.2.2.5.3 Russian
Russian resources model Subject – predicate
agreement as far as agreement in Nominal group. It is very similar to Czech
language – both keep their inflectional character. In agreement Russian is the same as Czech
(besides it does not have vocative and masculine inanimate gender). The
implementation is similar to the Czech implementation. So we do not consider
the technical details here. The resulting graph structure with grammar form for
2nd person plural indicative is shown in Figure
2. In Figure 3 we also show passive construction where the zero
auxiliary verb with grammar characteristics is shown and agreement in gender
with passive participle. The zero auxiliary is a very specific character of
Russian influencing in particular the non pro-dropping feature of the language
in difference to Bulgarian and Czech.
1.2.2.6 Example of generation
The Figure 1 depicts structure graph of the following sentence:
(18) E: You enter the command.
Cz: Vy zadáte příkaz.
L: You-MPl2 enter-2Pl command
From inflection features (in boxes), you can see that Finite has the same number and person as subject has.
Figure 1 – Subject – predicate agreement (Cz)
The Figure 2 depicts structure graph of the following sentence:
(19) E: You draw an arc.
Ru: Вы нарисуете дугу
L: You-MPl2 enter-2Pl command
Figure 2 – Subject – predicate agreement (Ru)
Figure 3 – Passive construction with zero auxiliary verb agreement (Ru)
1.3 Agreement within nominal group
1.3.1 Analysis
Within the nominal group, there is agreement between the head (pro)noun (Thing) and premodifiers, i.e., deictics and qualities, such as Status, Provenance, Age, Size and Colour.
1.3.2 Implementation
Each language uses only systems that it needs (Bulgarian omits systems dealing with case, Bulgarian and Russian omits inanimate gender, etc.)
For discussion about implementation of agreement with coordinated subject see 1.2.2.4
1.3.2.1 Status, provenance, …
1.3.2.1.1 Higher rank – Nominal group
In the same way as Nigel does, we distinguish five types of qualities: Status, Provenance, Age, Size and Colour. The systems accounting for the types of possible qualities take the following form:
<X>-MODIFICATION (Nominal)
[<X>-Modified]
! <X>
<X>:Adjectival-group
<X>:Congruent
[Not-<X>-Modified]
Chooser <X>-Modification-Chooser
where <X> Î {Status, Provenance, Age, Size, Colour}
As and example, we show the system for Status (<X> = Status):
Status-MODIFICATION (Nominal)
[Status -Modified]
! Status
Status:Adjectival-group
Status:Congruent
[Not-Status-Modified]
Chooser Status-Modification-Chooser
Preselection of <X> as Congruent ensures that on the lower rank (adjectival group rank) it is known if the adjectival group should agree (be congruent) with its head.
Inflection of adjectival group is driven by preselections in systems described by following template:
<X>-<C>-<V>-PR
(Thing-<C>-<V> & <X>-Modified)
[<X>-<C>-<V>-Pr]
<X>::Quality-<C>-<V>
where
<X> Î {Status, Age, Provenance, Size, Colour}
<C> Î {Case, Gender, Number}
<V> Î {Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc, Voc, Loc, Ins} for <C> = Case
<V> Î {M, I, F, N} for <C> = Gender
<V> Î {Sg, Pl} for <C> = Number
Therefore, there is 5*(7+4+2) = 65 systems. If we added more complicated cases of agreement (e.g. dual number), there would much more systems. Unfortunately, there is not easily possible to generate all of these systems from some template similar to the one shown. Example of system described by the template:
STATUS-NUMBER-PL-PR (Thing-Number-Pl &
Status-Modified)
[Status -Number-Pl-Pr] Status
::Quality-Number-Pl
1.3.2.1.2 Lower rank – Adjectival group
CONGRUENT-FORK (Adjectival-Group)
[Congruent]
[Not-Congruent]
:Chooser Under-Status-Chooser
Inflection of Quality is realized by following three systems:
QUALITY-CASE (Congruent)
[Quality-Case-Nom]
Quality:::Case-Nom-Form
[Quality-Case-Gen]
Quality:::Case-Gen-Form
[Quality-Case-Dat]
Quality:::Case-Dat-Form
[Quality-Case-Acc]
Quality:::Case-Acc-Form
[Quality-Case-Voc]
Quality:::Case-Voc-Form
[Quality-Case-Loc]
Quality:::Case-Loc-Form
[Quality-Case-Ins]
Quality:::Case-Ins-Form
QUALITY-GENDER (Congruent)
[Quality-Gender-M]
Quality:::Gender-M-Form
[Quality-Gender-I]
Quality:::Gender-I-Form
[Quality-Gender-F]
Quality:::Gender-F-Form
[Quality-Gender-N]
Quality:::Gender-N-Form
QUALITY-NUMBER (Congruent)
[Quality-Number-Sg]
Quality:::Number-Sg-Form
[Quality-Number-Pl]
Quality:::Number-Pl-Form
1.3.2.2 Ordinal numerals
1.3.2.2.1 Higher rank – nominal group
Preselections on this rank drive inflections on lower rank.
Numerative-<C>-<V>-PR
(Thing-<C>-<V> & Numerified)
[Numerative-<C>-<V>-Pr]
Numerative:Temperer-<C>-<V>
where
<C> Î {Case, Gender, Number }
<V> Î {Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc, Voc, Loc, Ins} for <C> = Case
<V> Î {M, I, F, N} for <C> = Gender
1.3.2.2.2 Lower rank
Following systems inflectify ordinal numeral depending on preselections form higher rank.
ORDINAL-CASE (Congruent)
[Ordinal-Case-Nom]
Ordinal:::Case-Nom-Form
[Ordinal-Case-Gen]
Ordinal:::Case-Gen-Form
[Ordinal-Case-Dat]
Ordinal:::Case-Dat-Form
[Ordinal-Case-Acc]
Ordinal:::Case-Acc-Form
[Ordinal-Case-Voc]
Ordinal:::Case-Voc-Form
[Ordinal-Case-Loc]
Ordinal:::Case-Loc-Form
[Ordinal-Case-Ins]
Ordinal:::Case-Ins-Form
ORDINAL-GENDER (Congruent)
[Ordinal-Gender-M]
Ordinal:::Gender-M-Form
[Ordinal-Gender-I]
Ordinal:::Gender-I-Form
[Ordinal-Gender-F]
Ordinal:::Gender-F-Form
[Ordinal-Gender-N]
Ordinal:::Gender-N-Form
ORDINAL-NUMBER (Congruent)
[Ordinal-Number-Sg]
Ordinal:::Number-Sg-Form
[Ordinal-Number-Pl]
Ordinal:::Number-Pl-Form
1.3.2.3 Cardinal numerals
1.3.2.3.1 Higher rank – nominal group
Preselections on this rank drive inflections on lower rank.
Numerative-<C>-<V>-PR
(Thing-<C>-<V> & Numerified)
[Numerative-<C>-<V>-Pr]
Numerative:Temperer-<C>-<V>
where
<C> Î {Case, Gender }
<V> Î {Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc, Voc, Loc, Ins} for <C> = Case
<V> Î {M, I, F, N} for <C> = Gender
1.3.2.3.2 Lower rank
Following systems inflectify cardinal numeral depending on preselections form higher rank.
TEMPERER-CASE (Simplex-Cardinal)
[Temperer-Case-Nom]
Temperer:::Case-Nom-Form
[Temperer-Case-Gen]
Temperer:::Case-Gen-Form
[Temperer-Case-Dat]
Temperer:::Case-Dat-Form
[Temperer-Case-Acc]
Temperer:::Case-Acc-Form
[Temperer-Case-Voc]
Temperer:::Case-Voc-Form
[Temperer-Case-Loc]
Temperer:::Case-Loc-Form
[Temperer-Case-Ins]
Temperer:::Case-Ins-Form
TEMPERER-GENDER (Simplex-Cardinal)
[Temperer-Gender-M]
Temperer:::Gender-M-Form
[Temperer-Gender-I]
Temperer:::Gender-I-Form
[Temperer-Gender-F]
Temperer:::Gender-F-Form
[Temperer-Gender-N]
Temperer:::Gender-N-Form
TEMPERER-NUMBER (Simplex-Cardinal)
[Temperer-Number-Sg]
Temperer:::Number-Sg-Form
1.3.2.4 Deictic
Main difference between deictic and previous parts of sentence is, that deictic does not have its own rank – it is on the same level as Thing is.
Det-<C>-<V>
(Thing-<C>-<V> & Explicit-Deictic)
[Det-<C>-<V>-Pr]
Deictic:::<C> -<V>-Form>
where
<C> Î {Case, Gender, Number }
<V> Î {Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc, Voc, Loc, Ins} for <C> = Case
<V> Î {M, I, F, N} for <C> = Gender
<V> Î {Sg, Pl} for <C> = Number
1.3.2.5 Language differences
1.3.2.5.1 Czech
Previous implementation describes Czech, because it has all morphological features present in other two languages.
1.3.2.5.2 Russian
In agreement within nominal group, Russian is the same as Czech (besides it does not have vocative and masculine inanimate gender). The implementation is similar to the Czech implementation. So we do not consider the technical details here.
1.3.2.5.3 Bulgarian
The same is true for Bulgarian (besides it does not have cases and masculine inanimate gender). Bulgarian also has different treatment of deictics
In Bulgarian the (nominal group's) Deictic is realized as function of the whole nominal group, so the scheme of preselections in their rank (NG) and inflections on the lower rank is kept here.
In Bulgarian when Deictic of nominal group is SPECIFIC, DEMONSTRATIVE and NONSELECTIVE (in NIGEL terms), which is analogue to English Deictic "the", it is realized as a morphological marker by the morphological module. This marker (the Deictic) could be carried by different element of the nominal group (Numerative, Quality, Thing). When the Thing is inflectified the following system is used:
NOMINATIVE-NONSELECTIVE-NOUN
(Nonselective & Nominative &
Not-Status-Modified &
Not-Colour-Modified & Not-Age-Modified &
Not-Size-Modified & No-Post-Deictic
)
[Full-Article] Thing:::Definite-Word-FA
When the Deictic is demonstrated by the element of the adjectival group we use the system shown bellow to transform the Deictic function to preselection of adjectival group:
ADJECTIVAL-GR-DETERMINATION-FA
(Nominative & Nonselective &
(Status-Modified
| Colour-Modified Age-Modified |
Size-Modified
Post-Deictic-Modified))
[Full-Article-AG] AG-Deictic:FA-Determination
Further the characteristic FA-determination (full-article-determination) is associated with a particular element of the adjectival group by the realization statement of the next system:
ADJECTIVAL-GR-ARTICLE-REALIZATION
(Adjectival-Group)
[FA-Determination]
Quality:::Definite-Word-FA
Numerative:::Definite-Word-FA
Ordinal:::Definite-Word-FA
Same mechanism is used for NONSPECIFIC, NONSELECTIVE, SINGULAR Deictic, which is in Bulgarian a morphological marker corresponding to English Deictic "a(n)".
All other types of deictics in nominal
group (specific and non-specific) have the feature Explicit-Deictic and for their agreement with the Thing element in gender and number
are used systems of the type DET-<C>-<V>
1.3.2.6 Example of generation
The Figure 4 depicts structure graph of the following sentence:
(20) E: Enter the fifth external point.
Cz: Zadejte pátý externí bod.
L: Enter-Pl2 fifth-ISgAcc external-ISgAcc point-ISgAcc
From inflection features (in boxes), you can see, that Ordinal under Ordinator and Quality under Status have the same gender (masculine inanimate – gender-i-form), number (singular – number-sg-form) and case (accusative – case-acc-form) as Thing. This is ensured by preselections marked by ellipses.
Figure 4 - Agreement within nominal group
1.4 Agreement of subject and predicative adjective
1.4.1 Analysis
From some point of view agreement with predicative adjective is mixture of subject-verb agreement and agreement within nominal group. Predicative adjective agrees with subject in gender, number and case[22] (only nominative or genitive are possible).
(21) E: The command is accessible.
Bg: Командата
е
достъпна.
L: Command-FSg is-Sg3 accessible-FSg
Cz: Příkaz je dostupný.
L: Command-ISgNom is-Sg3 accessible-NomISg.
(22) E: Lines are visible.
Bg: Линиите са видими.
L: Line-Pl are-Pl3 visible-Pl
Cz: Úsečky jsou viditelné.
L: Line-FPlNom are-Pl3 visible-FPlNom.
(23) E: Five lines are visible.
Cz: Pĕt úseček je viditelných.
L: Five-Nom line-FPlGen[23] is-Sg3 visible-FPlGen.
1.4.2 Implementation
Predicative adjective in Nigel is realized as Quality under Attribute (See Figure 4).
1.4.2.1 Preselections on the clause rank
Preselection of Attribute is performed by the following system. Agreement operator ensures that Attribute is preselected[24] for gender number and case if appropriate feature is entered in Subject.
SUBJECT-PREDICATIVEADJ-AGREEMENT (Ascriptive
& Subject-Inserted)
[Subject-Predicativeadj-Agreement]
(Subject ~ Attribute
(Thing-Gender-M =
Quality-Gender-M)
(Thing-Gender-I =
Quality-Gender-I)
(Thing-Gender-F =
Quality-Gender-F)
(Thing-Gender-N =
Quality-Gender-N)
(Thing-Number-Sg =
Quality-Number-Sg)
(Thing-Number-Pl =
Quality-Number-Pl)
(Thing-Number-Nom
= Quality-Number-Nom)
(Thing-Number-Gen =
Quality-Number-Gen))
Current version of KPML (3.0) does not show preselections done by agreement operator in the structure graph (C.f. Figure 5).
1.4.2.2 Adjective group rank
The inflection of Quality inserted under Attribute is done by systems QUALITY-CASE, QUALITY-GENDER, QUALITY-NUMBER, described in chapter 1.3.2.1.2 above.
1.4.2.3 Example of generation
The Figure 5 depicts structure graph of the following sentence:
(24) E: Commands are accessible.
Cz: Příkazy jsou dostupné.
L: Commands are-Pl3 accessible-IPl.
You can see, that Quality under Attribute has the same gender and number as subject (masculine inanimate – gender-i-form and plural – number-pl-form). Preselections done by agreement operator are not displayed in Structure graph.
Figure 5 - Agreement of subject and predicative adjective
1.4.2.4 Language differences
1.4.2.4.1 Czech
Previous implementation describes Czech, because it has all morphological features present in other two languages.
1.4.2.4.2 Bulgarian
Bulgarian omits in system SUBJECT-PREDICATIVEADJ-AGREEMENT lines responsible for agreement in inanimate gender and case:
SUBJECT-PREDICATIVEADJ-AGREEMENT (Ascriptive
& Subject-Inserted)
[Subject-Predicativeadj-Agreement]
(Subject ~ Attribute
(Thing-Gender-M =
Quality-Gender-M)
(Thing-Gender-F = Quality-Gender-F)
(Thing-Gender-N =
Quality-Gender-N)
(Thing-Number-Sg =
Quality-Number-Sg)
(Thing-Number-Pl =
Quality-Number-Pl))
1.5 Conclusion
Agreement in Bulgarian, Czech and Russian is more complicated than similar phenomenon in English. It is driven mostly by syntactical properties of agreeing units. Implementation described above covers all agreement necessary for final corpora of Agile; moreover it implements many cases not covered by the corpora. Modularity and overall design of all systems allows easy enhancement for more special cases in the future. The only exception is agreement with coordinated subject that is impossible to be fully covered in current version of KPML.
1.6 References
Kopečný
František (1962): Základy české skladby, SPN Praha
Bémová A. et al. (1995): Linguistic problems of Czech, Project Peco 2924, Charles University Prague